


Intents and Purposes

by loudspeakr, missingparentheses



Category: Rhett & Link
Genre: 5+1 Things, Childhood Friends, College, Drunkenness, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, M/M, pining!Rhett
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-16
Updated: 2017-04-16
Packaged: 2018-10-19 20:55:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10647897
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/loudspeakr/pseuds/loudspeakr, https://archiveofourown.org/users/missingparentheses/pseuds/missingparentheses
Summary: Five times it wasn’t real; the one time it was.





	Intents and Purposes

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Tropetastic Tuesday #6: "Pretending to be a couple / fake married".

**One**

They’re eight years old and driven inside by the rain. They eat pudding cups and peanut butter sandwiches, and Link puts a cassette into the tape player and presses ‘record’. Rhett laughs as his friend sings a made-up theme song to an equally made-up sitcom. Then Link lowers his voice into as deep a register as he can muster.

“Honey, I’m home!”

He looks at Rhett expectantly, and Rhett – with a mouth full of pudding – claps his hand to his chest and throws his head back in a laugh.

“Why are you the man? I should be the man!”

“Because I thought of it!” Link’s pouting. “Why should you be the man?”

“I’m taller!”

“Some men are shorter than their wives.”

Rhett laughs again, setting his food aside, and settles into a deep rendition of his own. “Welcome home, honey! How was your day?”

“Quit it!” Link slaps him on the arm. “We can’t both be the husband!”

“I dunno, I heard about these guys that–”

“Rhett!” Link squeaks, his cheeks heating up.

“Well then, you’re gonna have to be the lady ‘cause I ain’t doin’ it.”

Link rolls his eyes, then shifts into character, batting his eyelashes and putting on his most feminine voice. “Hi honey, how was work?”

 

*****

 

**Two**

Rhett is nineteen, Link eighteen. It’s Friday night and they’re at a house party, a welcome reprieve after a hard week of studying and exams. Rhett is half a beer in, about one and a half behind Link, when Grant saunters up to them, his voice a little louder than necessary despite the volume of the room.

“Man, that was some gay shit y’all were up to the other night! What was that about anyway?” He waggles his eyebrows at them. “You two, like, a couple?”

Link throws his head back and laughs, high and bright, and Rhett feels his stomach drop as he scrambles to figure out what Grant is even talking about. Then he remembers: he’d pulled his “I’m Dead” move on Link when a) they were in only their boxers, and b) the door was cracked open. They’d spotted Grant in the doorway, but he hurried away before they could say anything. Rhett doesn’t know what he was thinking, pulling something like that with the door open. They’re adults now, not little kids. They can’t just do that kind of thing anymore.

Rhett laughs nervously along with Link, holding his beer close to his chest. But it seems his friend has other ideas, as Link wraps an arm around Rhett’s waist. “I guess there’s no sense in denyin’ it anymore, huh? Ain’t that right, baby?”

“Whatever, dude.”

“Come on,” Link croons. Rhett can feel his face burning, even moreso when he notices Grant readying a response. “Don’t be like that, sweetheart. You ashamed of me?”

“You’re such an idiot.”

“And you love it,” Link murmurs, and he reaches back to grab a handful of Rhett’s behind. Rhett yelps and jumps away from his side.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, dude! That’s _enough_!” He turns to Grant. “We are not a couple, okay? We were just wrestlin’, man. It was no big deal. Link’s just bein’ a jerk.”

Grant snickers, looking smug. “Whatever you say, buddy.”

 

*****

 

**Three**

There’s no denying it: Rhett’s nervous. Nothing’s happened yet – they’re only just walking up to the front door – but he already wants to run.

He and Link like to really study the subjects of their local commercials, so it was at Link’s insistence that they accompany Walter, the repo man, on one of his more intricate heists. In another life, this would be right up Rhett’s alley, the thrill of a nighttime raid. But alas, with a bad back like his and a tendency to take flight rather than fight, it was not meant to be.

Walter – being the one with the kevlar vest – has them following him, with Link in the middle closely shadowed by Rhett. Link’s got the camera tonight because, judging by the way Rhett’s palms are sweating, it would be on the ground in seconds if something were to go wrong.

They step up onto the porch, and Walter knocks on the door. Rhett’s shivering, either his nerves playing up or the 4AM cold sinking into his limbs. Then the door opens, and a man emerges to the steady spotlight of their camera.

As expected, the guy isn’t happy, and though the negotiations are on the calmer side of things for the moment, the flash of movement Rhett spots inside the house does nothing to ease his anxiety. His instincts are right, and before they know it, they’re being led back out into the front-yard, barely-restrained expletives being hurled at them by the guy and his burly friend.

With Link intent on catching Walter in action, the two of them split off from Rhett, who is easily crowded off by the bodyguard. He’s definitely not _actually_ a bodyguard, but with a body as hulking and built like his, he may as well be.

Rhett reaches for his go-to defence: comedy.

“Nice night for it, eh?”

The guy huffs through his nose, brows still knit tightly together. Rhett lets out a nervous chuckle.

“You, uh. Those are _some_ muscles, man.”

“Fuck off, faggot.”

Rhett’s heart hammers in his chest. “What?”

“You heard me. Quit lookin’ at me, and go back to your little boyfriend.” Despite the immediate danger in his face, Rhett chances a look back at Link still filming the goings-on at the truck. Rookie mistake, it turns out, the guy easily following his line of sight. “ _Yeah_ , I knew it. Get the fuck outta here.”

That menacing drawl is still bouncing around his head when he and Link meet back inside the truck a few minutes later. Despite his best efforts, the scene back there keeps replaying in his head, asking to be scrutinized. The guy’s assumption hadn’t bothered him – it’d confused him, sure – but Rhett would’ve taken him on had he lunged, at either himself or even at Link. In fact, he would’ve been glad to take the full brunt if it meant keeping his best friend safe. He would hold Link’s well-being above his own anytime.

The thought brings forth a misguided rush of adrenaline – the result of either the hypothetical confrontation or his epiphany, he isn’t too sure which – and it takes his full concentration to loosen the fist he has ready at his side.

“I definitely felt like I was gonna get punched,” Rhett vaguely hears Link say beside him. He decides there’s no need to comment on the irony.

 

*****

 

**Four**

It’s all Rhett can do to keep it together when he sees that Link has tears in his eyes. But the stupid, unruly black wig keeps swinging in his face, and he keeps having to brush it back, clinging to the fringes of his character like a lifeline.

They’re both still talking on auto-pilot as they slowly slip back into themselves, and Rhett’s hands decide to stroke the table with nowhere else more satisfying to place them. _Get it together, Neal_ , he wants to say, but doing so will only emphasize the man’s unrest.

Rhett needs to diffuse the situation _now_ , for the sake of appearances, if not for themselves.

What’s the big deal anyway? They made exactly zero skin contact, just lips pressed to a sheet of plexiglass. Yet Link is unnerved for whatever reason, more than Rhett’s ever seen him, at least while on camera. Rhett’s a little more composed, sure, but that doesn’t mean he wasn’t affected. Still, he isn’t rambling and dazed like Link is.

“Wow… wow,” Link mumbles before he asks Rhett to remove the wig, eyes darting at the camera. “Yeah, I just, I would like to move on from the whole plexiglass thing.”

Rhett lets the wig fall away with the moment that was, and that’s when he finally feels it like a slow-motion punch to the solar plexus, wondering when it will ever let him go. For all the time he’d spent convincing himself that he was alone in this, the way Link’s shaken up over the non-kiss has shaken Rhett down.

He’s almost managed to escape the feeling, to remember that it’s nothing at all. But then Jason speaks up once the More ends and the camera switches off. He chuckles, shaking his head.

“Wow, Link.”

“What?” Link counters, bordering on offended.

“That kiss got you a little rattled?”

“Shut up. It was traumatizing. You’d react the same way.”

“Whatever, man.” Jason drops it, a wise move, and Rhett keeps his mouth shut.

But then Link is too quiet for comfort for the rest of the day, so he feels compelled to bring it up again on the drive home.

“I'm sorry about that stupid kiss thing, man.”

“What?” Link looks startled for a moment before his cool demeanor returns. “Oh. No big deal.”

“And I mean,” Rhett continues, despite knowing he should probably quit while he’s ahead, “Jason shouldn't have gone on about it. I mean, whatever. So the idea of kissing me was _traumatizing_ ,” he chuckles lightly, “even through a sheet of plastic. That's totally a legit reason to fall to pieces.”

Link thankfully laughs, the tension broken, and smacks Rhett on the arm. “Shut up, dude.” And Rhett finally leaves it be, happy to see a grin back on his friend's face.

There’s probably no need to mention the motivation behind his impulse to initiate the kiss in the first place. Link wouldn't benefit from knowing how his best friend imagines sometimes what it would be like to lean in, their lips moving toward one another, pressing together. None of that really matters anyway, not when Link’s content with what they have now.

If pretend is all they’ll ever have, pretend will have to be enough.

 

*****

 

**Five**

Rhett squints down at the menu in front of him, as if he doesn’t already know what he’ll be having. He’d had his order picked out before they even left the studio because there’s nothing like being zapped a couple dozen times with a shock collar to really get your appetite going.

“Man, there’s still static happenin’ on my arm.” Across the table, Link’s running a hand over his forearm, face cringing. Rhett hates being shocked, absolutely hates the prickling sensation under his skin. And with Link’s tolerance a notch lower than his, he’s sure his friend had a worse time of it than he did. Link’s discomfort gets his sympathy every time. “Ugh, I can _feel_ it.”

“That’s cos we got that spark, baby,” Rhett says without missing a beat, and Link’s eyes lift to meet his. “Even though I killed you with my dog earlier.”

“And I forgive you, Hogan, you know why?” Rhett’s already laughing when Link reaches for his arm, playing along. “Because you light my fire, you’re so hot.”

His hands are clutched at his stomach, tears in his eyes, when the waitress eventually comes around. He manages to quit chuckling long enough to order his chicken salad, juice to go with it. Link gets a cheeseburger, still grinning when he says he’ll stick with water.

“You know you want a shake, man,” Rhett pipes up, and Link relents, adding a chocolate milkshake to his order. When he gets up to leave for the bathroom, their waitress leans in.

“How long have you guys been together?” she asks, smiling warmly as she picks up their menus. It’s a question Rhett has grown used to answering.

“Thirty-four years.”

“Wow, and you’re still making each other laugh like that,” and she shakes her head. “You’re a lucky man.” She’s gone before her assumption makes itself clear.

It’s the first thing Rhett blurts out when Link returns.

“That’s great,” he laughs, and Rhett’s face warms. “I bet she was embarrassed when you told her.”

He’s about to ask why – _why would that be embarrassing?_ – when they’re interrupted by the arrival of their food. It’s all right: there’s time enough for that later.

 

*****

 

**Six**

The Dutch spring air is a different story entirely to the air they left back in LA. It’s both cleaner and thicker somehow, and it’s doing its best to help Rhett clear his head of the local gin they sampled earlier tonight. They’d met up with a few of their colleagues for post-con drinks, and Link had ended up having a few more than he’d planned. That’s how Rhett came to be dragging his less-than-sober partner down the street to their hotel, back to their waiting families.

“‘Sst, Rhett.” The slurred speech of a defeated man hits his ear, so despite his sour mood, Rhett cranes his neck to listen. “Stop, juss stop.”

He does. He isn’t as steady as he’d like to be, but compared to the Linkster, he’s holding his own.

“Rhett? You mad at me?”

He is. Damn right, he is. Anyone would be after the display Link had put on earlier, making a fool out of both of them. Because when Link really drinks, he gets handsy. And flirty. And downright inappropriate. And because he’s a married man, he doesn’t direct this behaviour at other ladies, definitely not. He directs it at Rhett.

“Ain’t my man the purdiest?” he’d just about yelled to the rest of the bar, and Mamrie – among others – had devolved into a fit of drunken giggles. Proud of the reactions he was getting, Link hooked an arm around Rhett’s neck before pressing a wet kiss to his cheek. “Work husband, why you so tense? Ain’t I enough for ya? Ain’t _this_ enough?” And he’d grabbed at Rhett’s ass for good measure. For old time’s sake.

Rhett’s head was swimming, but he wasn’t drunk enough to miss the pointed look Anthony shot at Grace, or the quiet smugness that fell off of Hannah in waves. He’d hauled Link out of there before he could do any more damage.

“Rhett?”

With the street aglow around them, Rhett snaps out of it to find wide blue eyes trying to catch his. Link’s got a hold on Rhett’s shoulders, keeping him stayed put, leaving him with no choice but to return the eye contact.

“Please don’t be mad at me.”

“I’m not, Link.”

“You don’t hafta lie to me.” His eyes are still wide, pupils blown, half-conscious apologies written all over his face. “I’m sorry.”

“But you’re not, Link! You can’t be sorry ‘cos you don’t know!” Honestly, Rhett hardly knows either, but he trusts that his brain knows where it’s going. “You don’t know how long, how I’ve always...”

“How long what?”

“How long I’ve–” And he feels something snap. “Oh, _screw it_.”

Rhett feels himself cave in, feels the numbness of his lips press up against the warmth of Link’s. His hands find narrow hips to hold, long fingers hooking into the belt loops of Link’s jeans and pulling him close. He forgets to breathe, choosing to focus only on the caress of Link’s fingertips through his beard, on the miracle of Link’s tongue searching for his. They're making out in the street, for anyone and everyone to see, but Rhett can hardly find it in himself to care.

When they finally break apart, it’s the lightest Rhett has felt in years.

“Wow.” He feels dizzy, and he doubts it has anything to do with the alcohol in his system. “That was…”

There’s a deadpan look on Link’s face when Rhett eventually notices. For once, he can’t tell what’s going on in Link’s head, but if history dictates, it isn’t too far from what Rhett’s thinking.

And what Rhett’s thinking is that he’s itching for another kiss.

“Rhett.” He feels Link’s breath wash over him, can feel the difference between it and the warm breeze tonight. “I don’t… Was that a joke?”

“A joke?” Rhett tries to process the meaning of the word as he looks down into endless blue lit up beneath the streetlight. “Why would I… why would…”

“Rhett? What’s going on? Why did you do that?”

“Link, I–” Rhett's brow furrows. This doesn’t make sense. None of this makes any sense. “I thought…” So he kisses him again.

But Link tenses this time, a far cry from the casual way he'd slipped his tongue into Rhett's mouth a moment ago. He presses at Rhett's shoulders until he can see up into his eyes, and Rhett forces himself to look back.

“I'm sorry.” He can see Link’s angry now, his brow crinkling.

“What are you thinkin’, man?” He sounds so sober – Rhett feels it, too – a helping of cold reality dumped over them both.

“I'm sorry,” Rhett repeats, to himself as much as to Link.

“You should be. It was just a joke, Rhett. You shouldn't’ve…” Then his friend turns and storms down the sidewalk alone.

Rhett can only pray the alcohol will have done its job, that their moment will be forgotten by morning.

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the following: [(1)](https://youtu.be/v5itFvGgeqs) [(2)](https://youtu.be/g7zHKcYzjNQ?t=5m15s) [(3)](https://youtu.be/esk1L5jviRM) [(4)](https://youtu.be/miz8_h3BrU0?t=8m10s) [(5)](https://youtu.be/IeGA7tsmTw8), with (6) being RandL's recent trip to VidCon Europe 2017.
> 
> As always, kudos and comments are infinitely appreciated! You know what time it is!


End file.
